Walking Prevents Bone Loss Caused from Prostate Cancer Treatment

To kill the cancer cells, many men with localized prostate cancer frequently receive radiation therapy. In order to keeping the tumor from growing, this treatment is followed by months of hormone therapy that decreases testosterone and estrogen that feed the cancer cells.

Statistics revealed that men undergoing hormone therapy lose between 4 to 13 percent of their bone density on an annual basis, a rate that is greater than that of post-menopausal women.

A study recently presented in Los Angeles at the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology’s 49th Annual Meeting, found that exercise and walking may reduce, and even reverse, bone loss caused by hormone and radiation therapies. used in the treatment of localized prostate cancer. The authors of the study concluded that those patients who walked about five times a week for 30 minutes at a moderate pace maintained or gained bone density.